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Date: 1607

"If the happie Daemon of Vlisses direct not the wandering planet of my witte within the decent orbe of wisedome, my stammering pen seeming far ouergon with superfluitie of phrase, yet wanting matter I answer with the poet one only word inuerted."

— Walkington, Thomas (b. c. 1575, d. 1621)

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Date: 1642, 1655, 1668

"My eye, which swift as thought contracts the space / That lies between, and first salutes the place / Crown'd with that sacred pile, so vast, so high, / That whether 'tis a part of Earth, or sky, / Uncertain seems, and may be thought a proud / Aspiring mountain, or descending cloud, / Pauls, the...

— Denham, John, Sir (1615-1669)

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Date: 1642, 1655, 1668

"Nor wonder, if (advantag'd in my flight, / By taking wing from thy auspicious height) / Through untrac't ways, and aery paths I fly, / More boundless in my Fancy than my eie."

— Denham, John, Sir (1615-1669)

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Date: 1681

"Here at the fountain's sliding foot, / Or at some fruit tree's mossy root, / Casting the body's vest aside, / My soul into the boughs does glide; / There like a bird it sits and sings, / Then whets, and combs its silver wings; / And, till prepar'd for longer flight, / Waves in its plumes the var...

— Marvell, Andrew (1621-1678)

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Date: 1687

"This Heart of mine, now wreck'd upon despair, / Was once as free and careless as the Air; / In th' early Morning of my tender years, / E're I was sensible of Hopes and Fears, / It floated in a Sea of Mirth and Ease, / And thought the World was only made to please; / No adverse Wind had ever stop...

— Cutts, John, Baron Cutts of Gowran (1660/1-1707)

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Date: 1691

"However chast his Body may be, his Mind is extreamly prolifick; his thoughts are a perfect Seraglio, and he, like a great Turk, begets thousands of little Infants--Remarks, Fancys, Fantasticks, Crochets and Whirligigs, on his wandring Intellect, and when once begot, they must be bred--so out he ...

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

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Date: 1691

"Whilst his dull Body's for New-England bound, / His Soul (in Dreams) trots all the World around."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

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Date: 1691

"Wandring one Evening thro' a Cypress Grove--(I won't be positive, it might be Hazle, but t'other sounds better) revolving in my rambling Brain the Varietyes of Human Affairs, happen'd i' the Drove of Thoughts, that swarm'd up and down my Noddle to reflect on my own self (Sir, Your Humble Servant...

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

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Date: 1691

"Let it suffice, that my Soul for ought I know, has been Rambling the best part of this 6000 Years, if those are in the right on't who hold the Præexistence, and that all Souls were made at once.

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

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Date: 1691

"For as I was expatiating in Dungrove Fields, my Mind and Body rambling alike, neither cared or knew whether, I out of a Childish wantonness gathered a bearded Ear of Grass or Corn, and put it into my Throat, thrusting it down so far, that when I went to pull it up again, being against the grain,...

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

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The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.